Week 4:

The first reading, "Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project" contained a lot of seemingly obvious things, like explaining how teens communicate, to surprising insight.  The insights I found interesting centered on how teens have such ever-present communication with each other.  The article talked about the many ways teens achieve these multiple presences, both online and off.  It talked about the work-arounds teens employ to maintain these networks.  This got me thinking about the potential of these latent networks, of how much that could be achieved if just some of this potential was harnessed.
  The interview with Lawrence Lessig was also interesting.  I have to admit I'm still confused about fair use and copyright law.  This confusion is something that troubles me.  I know that as an aspiring information professional, I need to address this deficiency.  It concerns me that Lessig was talking about how fair use in theory is more supported than it is in practice.  That makes me think even our courts are confused on this matter.
  The comic about fair use both frightened and enlightened me to just how complex this matter is.  The example of documentary use of music is crazy.  I never thought about how copyrighted our culture is.  Then I checked out the fair use evaluator tool, and I think that might help my confusion, however, it seemed Lessig was saying that fair use is not always applicable in the court of law.


I have far more work ahead of me...


P.S.  I really like the split up discussion threads.  I'm not gonna lie, I didn't listen to last weeks' podcast.  I thought I could do the readings and posts and that the podcast would just further explain stuff for people that need explaining.  I now see the error of my ways.  I will be listening now.

Information Science

I would like to write about both our science and our profession.  Many feel that our occupation needs to be one or the other; a science or a profession.  Yet I think we are both.  We used to be far more of a profession, but this weeks reading, “Information Behavior of the Researcher of the Future," proves how much scientific methods have been incorporated into our work.
   I can't tell you how much I appreciated seeing a scientific analysis that clearly stated how library patrons don't like the hierarchical organization that our profession has relied on since it began.  Of course, organization is necessary to some extent, but users are not librarians, and they increasingly favor access methods that they define, and that adapt to them.


  Users want information as easily as possible.  It is not our place to define acceptable information-seeking behavior.  It is our job to supplement and assist.


  Every time a librarian buries access to a material in a menu (with no search access or other means of access) they are severely limiting the material's exposure.  They are doing their library and patrons a disservice.  


  I feel that it is my job to tear down hierarchical organization systems.  I feel very strongly on this matter.  It just may be what I was put on this earth to do.  


Look out Dewey Decimal, I'm gunning for you!

Week #1:

Blogs, Wiki's, Podcasts... Chapter One:
    Richardson starts the book by highlighting how the web is a participatory medium, although the participation didn't largely come about until a proliferation of easy publishing tools and communities came about.  He talks about how disruptive this publishing potential has been, in the arenas of education, politics, journalism, and more.  He points out we are now part of a society of authorship, where we all contribute to a larger body of information via the internet.
    I like how he points out that educators' slow adoption of these learning tools has been to our detriment.  He points to educators and school policy as the issue, not students who wish to employ new, effective and efficient means of information transference.  This I agree with wholeheartedly.
   His toolbox includes:  Weblogs, Wikis, RSS feeds, Aggregators, Social Bookmarking, Photo Galleries, Audio Video Casting, Twitter, and Social Networking Sites.